U.S. History

It became apparent to me that following the heels of the presidential election, and listening to stories of American History on Your Story Hour, my six year old was very interested in American History. I also remember reading that the early elementary years are a great time to delve into this topic, so I began looking for a great way to study U.S. History.

Of course, in typical style, nothing seemed to match what I was looking for perfectly, so this is how I came up with our curriculum for American History.

I’ve had a couple people ask, and so I’m happy to just share the link for the document I’m using to plan our curriculum here. Just as a warning, it’s not finished, and I’m adding and updating as we go, so don’t be surprised if things change on it. I will let you know when it’s all done and share a PDF file that won’t change. 🙂 In the meantime, feel free to check this out if you think it will be helpful: U.S. History Lesson Plans.

I would love to hear from you! What are some of your favorite U.S. History resources for early elementary ages?

Here are all the links mentioned in the video:

Beautiful Feet Books:
The Early American History program fro Beautiful Feet books became my jumping off point and spine. Basically this program put everything into context for me, making the prospect of making my own curriculum doable and not ridiculously overwhelming.

The Mystery of History:
I really like the Mystery of History, and it’s likely to be the bones for most of our history over the next few years. In this case, I’m simply using the activities and some of the information as a supplement to what we are studying in American History.

Your Story Hour:
My son loves theses audio dramatizations, and he has learned so much about history though them. He would seriously listen to them for HOURS every day if I let him (let’s be real, sometimes I do.) How awesome is it that we can incorporate these great stories that he loves into our history?!?

Heroes of History for Young Readers:
I have loved the corresponding set of missionary stories for our family. The boys both love the books and we read them over and over again. I also love all of the additional activities and songs that go along with it. I can’t wait to incorporate some of these books into our history.

Drive Thru History American History:
Although these are intended for a bit older kids, we have watched a few clips of these online. My littlest (3 years old) just LOVES all the cars, and my oldest (6) is such a visual learner and LOVES seeing all the places and things he has heard and read about. I can’t wait to dive into these!

Rainbow Resource:
There isn’t a whole lot to say about Rainbow Resource except that it is one of my favorite homeschool resources, and one of my first stops when I am looking for homeschooling ideas and curriculum.

Scholastic 3-D Interactive Maps:
This is such a fun mapping resource that really brings the geography of the times to life. While I will likely be doing most of the work of making the maps for the kids at this age, there is so much they can do with them, and when we go back and study these things in later years, they can have a turn making the maps themselves. I absolutely love the breadth of topics covered in this resource as well!

Hana’s channel, Pepper and Pine:
Hana’s channel and blog is another one of my all time favorite resources for finding homeschool materials and supplies. Her reviews are fantastic and I love seeing what she is doing with her kids. If you prefer blogs over YouTube videos, check out her blog here.